July 01, 2010

Le Monde's Fate: Over After 66 Years?

Like virtually every other newspaper in the world, Le Monde is losing cash. As respected by Europeans as the New York Times is to Americans, it appears that the 66-year old newspaper may be out of cash within a couple of weeks. Monday Note reports on the evolution of French press over the past several years that has led to this moment:

* A steady erosion in readership.

* A lack of budget discipline, made worse by loose governance.

* The core newsroom’s reluctance to support the digital strategy.

* The collective certainty the “brand” was too beautiful to fail and that a deep-pocketed philanthropist will inevitably show up at the right time to save the company.

* A difficulty to invest into the future, to test new ideas, to built prototypes, or to invest in decisive technologies.

* A bottomless investment in the heavy-industry part of the supply chain, in costly printing facilities.

* An excessive reliance on public subsidies which account for about 10% of the industry’s entire revenue. Compared to Sweden, French newspapers have 3 times less readers, but each one gets 5 times more subsidies.

They are apparently seeking (needing?) at least €100m. Filloux gives an excellent account of its history, including his opinion and an assessment. He also includes a great set of stats and raw numbers. Take a look at the past three years. Source: Monday Note.

Their opinion of what they need? At a minimum, Filloux suggests an editorial and industrial project, restructuring, a strong and decisive human resources initiative and a long term approach - in other words, renovation won't be done overnight. If only newspapers understood this five years ago and started then, we wouldn't be reading about so many newspaper death marches ONLINE.